Bush Medicine Dreamingby Lulu Teece Petyarre

The painting depicts particular medicinal plant species the Alawayerre Aboriginal women collect from the Utopia region in Central Australia. The leaves of medicinal plants are gathered by the women, boiled, kangaroo resin added and mixed into a paste, which is used by Aboriginal people, as bush medicine to treat a variety of ailments. The dots represent a topography of Alawayerre country. The women also celebrate the Bush Medicine Dreaming in their Awelye ceremonies.

Artist

Lulu Teece Petyarre was born in approximately 1955 at Utopia outstation in Central Australia. Lulu is from the Alyawarre language group and her traditional country is Aharrenge. Lulu is the sister of Margaret Turner Petyarre who was an accomplished artist from Utopia who sadly passed away in 2009.

She began painting like many of the women in Utopia during the 1980’s whereby several community projects were run in the community. The Utopia Women’s Batik group was the first of these projects which sought to teach the women of Utopia how to create silk batiks using their traditional Dreamings or bush scenes as decorations. This project was highly successful with the project touring nationally and in Eire and Scotland. It was later acquired in full by the Robert Holmes a Court Collection. Lulu’s batik shared the story of the Kurrajong Seed Dreaming. In fact her silk batik is reminiscent of some of her canvas paintings today.

Lulu later moved to using acrylic paints and canvas as the medium for her artwork. The primary focus of her paintings includes Bush Medicine and Awelye (Women’s Body Paint Design). Her artworks are very detailed and intricate. Central Art is also excited to share one of her alternative paintings, painted in a naive art style. This particular painting depicts the Aboriginal community of Ampilatwatja.

Important copyright notice

The Copyright of all images and documentation remains with Sabine Haider. The Australian Copyright Act protects all artists from unauthorised copying by giving control over original works of art to the artist by law. However depending on the use proposed, Sabine Haider from Central Art – Aboriginal Art Store can facilitate reproduction of works with the permission of the artist as we have developed close relationships over the years with many individual painters and craftspeople.

We work closely with the Aboriginal Artists Agency Limited (AAA), a non-profit company established to encourage positive outcomes for artists in copyright administration. Please contact us directly to discuss any reproduction matters.

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